ISIS is putting high quality counterfeit passports from Syria. ABC News.

A false passport put out by ISIS. Homeland Security Photo/ABC News.

ISIS is putting out high quality counterfeit passports and may be using them to infiltrate the West. ABC News. A Homeland Security report obtained by ABC News shows that ISIS has been printing out the fake passports for the past 17 months. When ISIS captured the cities of Dier Ez Zour and Raqqa they were able to capture the passport offices located in both cities, as well the equipment needed to print new passports. Officials fear these false passports are good enough that they could have been used to infiltrate even the United States. Fake passports have already been found in Europe. At least two of the terrorists during the Paris attacks were later found with fraudulent passports. Sources told security forces that fake documents are so common in Syria, that the people no longer consider it a crime to possess them. Fake passports are easy to obtain and they can be bought for as little as $200. It is unclear if ISIS still has control of the passport making machines, as Dier Ez Zour has been long contested by the Syrian regime and the city of Raqqa is under heavy airstrikes. 

My Comment:

I'm a little late on this post, since I was busy the last couple of days. But this is a huge development. ISIS can obviously use these fake passports to infiltrate into other countries. I would have thought that they wouldn't have been able to get to America with them, but the report made it sound like they are already here. Indeed, these fake passports have been used in the past to infiltrate at least two men into Europe, who then went on to commit a huge terrorist attack. There is no reason to believe that they haven't done so in America as well, though I would hope that our vetting process, and the lack of the utter chaos that is the European migrant crisis, that less would slip through the cracks. But that would depend on our government being competent, and competence is an attribute that our government has in short supply... 

And ISIS isn't likely to lose control of these passport machines anytime soon. Though Dier Ez Zour is still contested territory, Raqqa is not. Indeed, Raqqa is the closest thing to a safe haven that ISIS has. Though it has come under some very heavy airstrikes lately, that doesn't mean that the machines are under any threat. My guess is that the machines and any blank passports have been secured and moved to a safer place. Perhaps one surrounded by civilians, where the US lead coalition would be reluctant to strike. Though the Russians and French are a bit more wiling to risk civilians casualties, I doubt the United States will do anything to fix this problem. And though Dier Ez Zour is contested, the front lines there have been static for a long time, and the regime troops there are surrounded and are only being supplied by the air. The city isn't likely to leave ISIS control anytime soon... 

To be honest there isn't much they could do anyways. Even if they had intelligence where these things are being printed out that doesn't mean they would be able to destroy them. Like I said, ISIS is probably shielding these things with civilians. And even if you did find out where these things were being made, you would have to make sure that you got all of them. Since we have no forces on the ground, and a commando raid is nigh impossible, there would be almost no way to confirm that we destroyed them. And ISIS would have a backup copy in Dier Ez Zour anyways. 

Of course, infiltrating terrorists isn't the only advantage ISIS can gain by putting out these false passports. Indeed, I think they are making a fair amount of money selling them to whoever wants to get out of Syria, or to refugees from other countries that want to be accepted into Europe. Iraqis, Afghans, and many people from Africa, are paying through the nose to get decent forgeries. Most of the people heading to Europe right now are economic migrants, not refugees, so a passport saying they are from Syria is a great way to play the sympathy card. And ISIS will be right their to sell them one. Not only do they get a decent amount of money from the transaction, the flood of false documents will increase the ease that they can get their people into Europe. 

This will probably become an election issue very soon, if it hasn't become one already. The media still seems to be stuck on Donald Trump's statements about barring all Muslims from traveling to America. Though this report is related, I am guessing that they won't want to extensively cover it because it basically shows that he was right. If ISIS is putting out near perfect forgeries, how is our immigration system going to handle them? This is a massive problem and I honestly don't know you handle it without barring immigration and travel from Syria. Though Trump's solution probably went to far, since it makes a lot less sense to ban Muslims from countries without much terrorism, it would fix the problem. Nobody else has put out a solution so far.

The problem is that ISIS may have used these passports to enter the United States already. If so, then we are closing the door after the cows have already left, assuming that anything gets done at all. It's very possible they are in America, planning attacks. And it's not like fake passports are the only way to get here. Obviously, one of the attackers in the San Bernadino attacks was able to slip through the cracks, and she had perfectly legitimate paperwork. She didn't have to fake her passport to get into the country. The threat is massive and I honestly don't know what we can do about it. Trumps solution would be messy, unpopular (internationally at least) and could have expected and unexpected consequences. Even a half measure like banning immigration and travel from Syria, wouldn't catch everyone. And all of this completely ignores all the potential terrorists that are already here... 

I do have to wonder if Donald Trump had some foreknowledge of this report. I know everyone had suspicions that there were massive amounts of fake documents out there, but the timing of this seems a bit suspect here. It's possible that somebody tipped him off that this report was coming, so he should double down hard on immigration restrictions against Muslims. I wouldn't be too surprised there, many in the government are not happy with our current administration, and I wouldn't put it past someone to send Trump's campaign the information. Still, it all could be a coincidence, and given how little I have heard about this report in the last couple of days, it might blow over anyways...